IN YOUR OPINION

Letters to the Editor for Sept. 10, 2013

Published: Monday, September 9, 2013 at 10:46 p.m.

Last Modified: Monday, September 9, 2013 at 10:46 p.m.

Transfer of power

We in Ocala are asked to vote on several city-charter amendments. The first listed amendment on our ballots is called “Qualifications and Elections of City Officials.” If adopted, this amendment means we would no longer have special-election runoffs. Loss of majority control of who becomes mayor or a City Council member? No thanks. That is reason enough to reject the amendment, but that isn’t the only reason to reject it.

You wouldn’t know it from reading the ballot description of the amendment, but what lurks behind just eight words is a transfer of power from voters to the City Council. If this amendment is adopted by voters, no longer will voters directly determine in the city charter, where other important aspects of elections are addressed, what happens when candidates for mayor or City Council leave a race because of death, removal or withdrawal. Instead, the City Council will determine this aspect of elections without direct voter approval. This is important because how candidate death, removal or withdrawal is handled can determine whether we have an election at all.

The current amendment language was a last-minute substitution for amendment language with a defined approach for handling candidate death, removal or withdrawal. It turns out the language removed from the amendment defined an approach that has been abused in other Florida localities by strong incumbents, who in effect appointed a successor to their elective office, avoiding voter approval of the successor. Even if we trust all current City Council members to not use power granted by this amendment to enact an election process and then abuse it, what about all future City Council members?

City Council members should not determine how you become a City Council member. The “fox guarding the henhouse” approach of this amendment is unacceptable. I will vote “No” to reject this amendment.

Joanne J. Brayton

Ocala

Global warmers

Last week in the news it was brought to our attention that a very tall, all-glass building in England reflected the sun so badly that it melted plastic on cars and other things parked below it and cooked an egg. Wow!

All our high-rises in America built close together coupled with lots of asphalt and concrete is heating up the atmosphere and contributing to global warming. It traps the natural flow of wind, which cools off the land.

Also contributing are the cutting down of our natural resource — trees, which temper our climate. Car emissions are one thing but this is a contributor, too, and should not be ignored.

Of course, our globe has gone through weather transitions over time — just ask the dinosaurs.

Pat Schmidt

Ocala

Really, Mr. Yoho?

Congressman Ted Yoho made an appearance on MSNBC’s “Hardball” last week. When asked if he believed President Obama was an American citizen, Mr. Yoho responded that he had not studied the issue enough to have an intelligent answer.

Really? It only takes a few minutes of time to see and read the president’s certificate of birth in Hawaii. But even if Mr. Yoho believes in the fantasy that the president was born in Kenya to an American mother, the answer to the question of whether the president is a citizen of this country can be quickly answered by looking at Article 2, Section 5 of the Constitution, which provides that both he and Texas Sen. Cruz, who was born in Canada, are both natural born citizens.

Mr. Yoho, the people of Florida’s 3rd Congressional District deserve better. President Obama was elected to the office of president two times by the American people. What public policy are you promoting by suggesting the president is not legitimate? Is your message to the residents of the district you represent is that ignorance is a virtue?

Jim Adkins

Ocala

Syria a distraction?

I hope that I am not the only person who believes that President Obama’s willingness to attack Syria is nothing more than a distraction to take Congress’s mind off of Obamacare (there is nothing about the Affordable Health Care Act that is AFFORDABLE), which goes into effect the end of this month.

Obama does not want Syria to be his legacy, but wants Obamacare to be the one thing that he is remembered for. Remember, you people that voted for Obama because he promised free health care, that whatever the government can give, the government can take away.

There is no way that we can attack Syria without retribution from Syria and her allies. How many of America’s youth will die because Obama started something with Syria that he cannot get out of now, just to take the Congress’s mind off of Obamacare?

Dick Meadows

Ocala

Syrian suspicion

I am writing in regards to the letter “Moral obligation” (Sept. 5).

The writer makes a compelling argument from the humanitarian point of view. However, comparing Nazi Germany with current Syria is at best weak. The main problem is that we have no concrete proof that the Syrian government is responsible for the sarin attack. So what is the response to be?

The real evidence overwhelmingly points to the rebels launching the attack to lure the world powers into the conflict. Why would we support either a totalitarian regime or a brutal rebel faction capable of killing their own people?

My take is one of suspicion. Just as it seems at long last we are going to be out of the Middle East, yet another conflict arises to lure us back in. Let’s just pull back and reinforce Israel and avoid any direct conflict.

We need to fix our own problems here before we start fixing the rest of the world.

Bill Cochran

Ocala

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